#Airisu: The Crow and the Witch

Banchō Sarayashiki (Sumika POV): Post 42
#Wss366 Quarry #TimeTravelAuthors Whatever

The woman examined the crow carefully, then nodded. "If your tsukai speaks the truth, I will release my quarry. Now, tell me the rest of the story. The crow says you are not done."

There isn't much more, and I'm sorry to have to relate it. Okiku couldn’t rest. The grudge she bore was so great that she haunted the well as an onryō, loudly counting the plates at night. When she reached the last and missing tenth plate, she screamed so horribly that anyone who heard it was said to go mad.

Eventually, a priest came, and as she reached nine, he shouted “Ten!” dispelling her.

“That’s it,” I said. “I think I’ve mixed different versions together, but the stories are similar in how Okiku meets her end and how she haunts the castle.”

“And the Lord?” the witch asked.

“The tales vary, but most agree he escaped unpunished,” I said. “It’s very unfair.”

“In tatters, in tatters. His honor was in tatters,” Airisu cawed.

The woman nodded, but remained silent. Then, with a sigh, she dished out a stew of grain and wild greens. Then, finally, said, “I doubt such a trick would dispel a grudge-bound spirit, but let us eat while I consider.”

#TootFic #Crows #Otherkin #Fantasy #UrbanFantasy #Serial #SlowBurn #Yuri #Folklore #NMFic #TimeTravel

#Airisu: The Crow and the Witch

Banchō Sarayashiki (Sumika POV): Post 41
#Wss366 Cable #TimeTravelAuthors Whatever

I hated to resume the story. The romance I sensed between the witch and Okiku should have had a happy ending, but only tragedy lay ahead. I pretended to sip my tea, now grown cold, and then began again:

“All would have been well for Okiku,” I continued, “if Aoyama had been content with that. But instead, he devised a plan to trap the maiden. When she was away, he hid one of the ten plates.”

When he called for them to be shown to him, Okiku was horrified to find only nine. She counted them over and over, but no matter how many times she did this, the tenth plate was always missing.

It was a sorrowful maiden who presented the remaining plates to Aoyama, for she knew the penalty for losing a plate was to be beheaded.

Instead of anger, the lord’s face bore a crafty look. His expression soon turned to rage when she declined his offer of “clemency.” That fury blossomed, turning into a beating, and finally, when she still refused him, he dragged her into the courtyard and hung her over a well.

“This is your last chance,” he raged. “Who are you to refuse me?” She met his demands with silence.

Infuriated, he dunked her into the well, nearly drowning her. When even that failed to break Okiku’s determination, with one final slash, Lord Aoyama severed the rope, and she plummeted to her death.

The witch held up her hand for me to stop; her face had grown grim. With a shaky hand, she poured more tea and threw grain for my familiar. When she’d calmed herself, she spoke. “It is as I feared. She acquitted herself well to the end. A vine #cable could not have been stronger than her honor. No shame will ever be attached to her name. Alas, if I were younger, I would avenge this slight. If her betrothed fails in his duty, then I’ll haunt both him and Aoyama.”

I trembled. This was not why I had come. Instead of rescuing Okiku, I was only bringing tragedy. The ghosts threatened to multiply. I looked pleadingly at Airisu and mouthed, “Do I have to finish my tale?”

“Go on,” she cawed. “The rest is sorrowful enough, but there is no need for the good lady to stain her karma with it. The taint lies upon the house of Aoyama. Even dead at the bottom of a well, Okiku’s name endured unclouded—besides, we’re here to rescue her!”

With these last words, Airisu fluffed up her feathers and strutted across the floor. At a less solemn time, I would have laughed.

#TootFic #Crows #Otherkin #Fantasy #UrbanFantasy #Serial #SlowBurn #Yuri #Folklore #NMFic #TimeTravel

#Airisu: The Crow and the Witch

Banchō Sarayashiki (Sumika POV): Post 40
#Wss366 Wilt #TimeTravelAuthors Whatever

“I will do my best, Holy One,” I said. “There are many versions of the tale, and I don’t know which one is correct.”

The witch sat across from me. The firelight reflected on her face, giving it a deceptive ruddy glow, even though I knew she was very sick. Airisu had stopped pecking at the grain and was looking between us intently. I was pleased that she hadn’t said anything rude so far.

“So, she is well remembered,” the woman said. “Tell whichever version you please.”

“I’m sure to mix the stories up,” I said.

The witch coughed and waved her hand dismissively, so I took heart and began.

In Himeji Castle, there was a beautiful lady-in-waiting named Okiku. It was her duty to care for a precious set of ten plates. This was a great honor, showing her breeding and how much her lord, Aoyama, valued her. But the lord’s feelings didn’t end there. He lusted after her and wished to make her his concubine.

Okiku #wilted under his attentions and refused his many advances, spurning both offered rewards and threatened punishments, for she was betrothed to a samurai named Takesune and remained faithful to him.

I stopped, first looking at the woman and then at Airisu, and asked, “How am I doing?”

Airisu made a funny, unbird-like gesture that resembled a shrug. I'd need to reward her later for keeping silent as I had directed.

For her part, the witch said, “Good enough. Okiku was fonder of me than of any man." A gentle smile stole over her face, and her eyes grew distant. "But she had been promised, and no pleading would turn her from the path laid before her. We were as husband and wife in all but name, yet she had her duties and I mine. How then would Lord Aoyama ensnare her?”

A cough interrupted the witch’s speech. Wiping her lips, she said, “Continue.”

#TootFic #Crows #Otherkin #Fantasy #UrbanFantasy #Serial #SlowBurn #Yuri #Folklore #NMFic #TimeTravel

#Airisu: The Crow and the Witch

Okiku (Airisu POV): Post 39
#Wss366 blaze #TimeTravelAuthors What ever

The two women sipped their drinks while I looked around. I had hoped to find vermin in the bedding, but nothing moved there. The miko kept an exceptionally clean place for a hermit.

“Your tsukai seems hungry,” the woman said. She reached into a bag and scattered a little millet among the pine needles.

I eyed her first, then the grain warily. She made no move toward her offering. Instead, she returned her focus to Sumika. Seeing it was safe, I hopped down and began pecking at the kernels that had fallen farthest from her, all the while keeping watch.

I jumped when she coughed again, then resumed eating.

The fire #blazed as a new leaf went into the flames.

“Holy one, I have something that might help,” Mistress said, removing the antibiotics from her sleeves. “These will cure you of most diseases.”

The shaman made a polite gesture of refusal. “Unlike Han Wu, I do not long for immortality. I am but a carp in a wheel rut. It dries, and my karma is upon me.”

The woman was neither melodramatic nor mournful; she was simply stating facts. Even Sumika picked up on the finality of her tone. Mistress held out the pills for a moment longer, then she put them away.

“But there is something you can do for me before I voyage on the Yellow River,” the elder witch said. “Free my lover from the bonds of the world, and I will pass you my power.”

Sumika sat bolt upright, the cup in her hand falling to the ground. “I–I don’t… can’t kill someone. I came to save them.”

“Could it be? Have you come for my Okiku?”

I stopped pecking at the grain and listened. “Okiku? How had the two of them divined each other’s purpose?” Regardless of how, it was a convenient “coincidence.”

“Yes, I came for Okiku,” Mistress said. “To save her.”

“Then I’ll rest easier,” the elder woman said. “Like the mountain pheasant, though we will sleep on opposite sides of the pass; I will know that she still enjoys the dawn. Now, tell me what you know of Okiku, and then I will help you.”

#TootFic #Crows #Otherkin #Fantasy #UrbanFantasy #Serial #SlowBurn #Yuri #Folklore #NMFic #TimeTravel

#Airisu: The Crow and the Witch

Okiku (Airisu POV): Post 38
#Wss366 color #TimeTravelAuthors 05/21. Do characters meet any relatives when they time travel?

The fog had lifted, and we found ourselves on a narrow mountain path. The moon now hung over pines growing along the bottom of a cliff face. In their shadows, a lean-to of boughs stood between the trees. It was from this rude dwelling that the firelight and voice had emerged.

Sumika took a deep breath. "Let me do the talking. There's no point in freaking them out."

Without waiting for an answer, she stepped toward the shelter, ducked, and entered.

Inside sat a woman with sallow skin, wild hair shot with gray, and weathered robes. She looked up from tending a pot and a teakettle hanging over a small fire and gave a welcoming smile, revealing teeth rotted from age. She might have been a Buddhist hermit, but her clothes were unsuitable for someone of that holy profession. Instead, I judged her to be a mountain witch, a wandering shaman, or a folk healer.

The space was neat with few belongings. Pine needles covered the floor, filling the room with a heavy, resinous scent. Behind her was a shallow cave containing a bed of ferns and a few tattered blankets.

I cocked my head, inspecting the woman. Then, crooning so only Sumika could hear, I said, “I hate to tell you, but she looks like you.” And she did. Age had dulled the #color of her black hair and wilted her flesh, but her oval face and mischievous eyes were the same. The tilt of her chin and the motion of her hands were calmer than Sumika’s, yet had the same natural grace. She could have been Mistress’s older sister or mother.

“As I might,” the woman said, coughed, and wiped the blood that appeared on her lips with a dried dock leaf. “Instead of finding the blessed land, I shall dwell in Kakuriyo until Dōken-shin calls me back to the world. Life is like this leaf,” she said, throwing the red-stained object into the fire, where it briefly blazed. “But the wheel turns, and tender buds spring forth where they once grew.”

“Hmm,” I thought and began puzzling over the metaphors.

“But sit,” she continued. “I forget my hospitality. I have tea and a poor stew. You’ll pardon my humble abode. I never could abide roofs and loathe flattery and insincerity. Here I can listen to the spirits, far from the floating world.”

Sumika lowered herself to the ground and knelt by the fire. “Holy Mother, who are you?”

“I have told you, child. We are the same spark. Gagaimo seeds adrift on the mountain’s wind.”

“Ah,” I thought. “This is the wandering miko Dōken-shin referred to. Not Sumika’s forebear, but Sumika herself at a different time and place.”

The woman coughed again, wiped her lips, and then poured tea into chipped cups.

#TootFic #Crows #Otherkin #Fantasy #UrbanFantasy #Serial #SlowBurn #Yuri #Folklore #NMFic #TimeTravel

#WordWeavers 17 How would your MC react to being handed a kitten?

It's part of #Airisu's contract, no cats allowed in the house. Sumika is sad about that.

So if it was Sumika who presented the kitten, there would be trouble!

#NMWW #NMPrompts